ZEUS CTI v1.2 released

[Pimmelorus 0]

Hi all,

I am happy and proud to anounce the release of ZEUS CTI.

Quote[/b] ]<ul>ZEUS CTI (ZSCTI) is an optimized form of MFCTI, the original capture-the-island modification for Operation Flashpoint (OFP). ZSCTI was designed to improve MFCTI scripts in order to reduce its CPU and network load, but to leave MFCTI game play and features unchanged. As a result game performance of ZSCTI is increased significantly compared to MFCTI, especially in multiplayer games. Game freezes and network desynchs, prominent problems of multiplayer MFCTI, are mostly eliminated even in 9 vs. 9 player games

Quote[/b] ]<ul>Changes were made to practically all scripts of MFCTI to improve CPU and network performance. One of the most prominent change is the introduction of CoC Network Services to mediate all network related procedures. Also, looping scripts were eliminated and, where appropriate, replaced by eventhandlers. Similarly, 70 triggers were removed from the map and replaced by a moving 4 trigger system.

One aim of ZSCTI was to leave the MFCTI game as experienced by the player unchanged. Noticeable changes were only introduced where needed to improve on the reliability of MFCTI. Examples are scripts that counter the so-called "ammo-bug" (spillage of ammo from ammo boxes that lag the game) and error checking procedures that ensure all players have identical game related information (e.g., number and types of factories) after a period of network congestion.

Read more on ZEUS CTI on the ZEUS CTI homepage

In addition, we at ZEUS have plans to start modding ZEUS CTI to offer new addons to play with and possible small changes in gameplay. Experienced and enthousiastic members of the scripting community are invited to join the ZEUS CTI team and produce a new set of attractive CTI maps.

Thnx for your attention.

Greetz, Pimmelorus

[MEDICUS 0]

Very nice!

Keep it up Pimmelorus

[bn880 5]

Good stuff, I was wondering what ever happend to you Pim.

[Pimmelorus 0]

lol, I was not dead, merely ... well ... I was on holidays. Well, it is all right now again

[lee_h._oswald 0]

This sounds great!

It should be posted on some more places here in the forum!

MfG Lee

[Pimmelorus 0]

That's not really allowed I guess....

[lee_h._oswald 0]

Hmm, there is an addon inside and you can call it "modification", so it should be fine to show it in: Addons & Mods Complete.

Also everyone is complaining about not enough missions.

---

I have made a short test offline and it looks like it works very well. Great performance!

Big thank you!

I hope to see a big "addon" version with all the good modern stuff that has been released!

MfG Lee

[Ex-RoNiN 0]

No, its just fine in here

[.pablo. 0]

so what happens when mfcti comes out with a new version

(are you just gonna port the changes to zeus?)

oh and btw, thats a great banner (the mfcti one looks way too crappy for the quality of the product it represents)

[Pimmelorus 0]

OK, Mike Melvin told me that in the near future a new version of MFCTI (MFCTI 1.17) will be released, that, to his saying, also offers better performance.

As I am convinced that MFCTI will never be faster then ZEUS CTI (believe me, i looked at the scripts for half a year ), there is not reason for me to bother much about changes in MFCTI 1.17.

I ONLY will make changes in ZSCTI that correspond to gameplay changes (options and unit changes) introduced in MFCTIn 1.17.

[-=BT=- Matty R 0]

sounds all good

[Artak 0]

Played it. Didn't like it. Way too many errors.

Coop version on Nogova with four players (one hosting). Play mode was Defend The Base.

Is this ment for dedicated servers only or didn't you do any beta testing?

[Hotkey 0]

Played it. Didn't like it. Way too many errors.

Coop version on Nogova with four players (one hosting). Play mode was Defend The Base.

Is this ment for dedicated servers only or didn't you do any beta testing?

Os, CPU, Ram?

[Artak 0]

Windows 2000 professional (SP4)

AMD Athlon XP2000+

1024 Mb 266Mhz DDR-SDRAM

OFP 1.96, no other addons installed except the ZScti.pbo and DXDLL

[bn880 5]

Maybe you have an example error?

[Artak 0]

Hmm let's see what I can remember..

- When viewing the score most of the values were scalar bool array string

- A constant error telling something wrong with addtoteamresources (or something like that)

- Occasionally a debug hint error saying something about something

- Voting system didn't work

- AI commander stopped building after a while

- All players were marked as AI in the transfer resources window

- The Ak101 addon weapon had no textures

- ect.

- After a while of playing there apeared a constant lag every few seconds. I may have heard that excessive amount of eventhandlers can cause this.

If I had known I would have made a proper list when playing.

[Pimmelorus 0]

Hmmm ok, problems can occur, and I am not offended by error reports, but can you be a bit more precise? Many of your problems I do not recognize at all....

Edit: ZEUS CTI is not without error still, i know. Errors were reported in the last days that concern the mortar, the salvagers, as wel as something on the max vehicle limit. These errors will be investigated. All error reports that are well founded I appreciate a lot. I hope with the patient help of the OFP community ZEUS CTI will get rid of the bugs it still contains.

[-=BT=- Matty R 0]

well i got a friend to upload the ZeusMFCTIs onto the server cos they just need the MFs addons but the Coop version is buggy because some of the prices are wiered start off with 2 little money and your money goes into minus (-)

but the non coop version is great

[Pimmelorus 0]

aaahhhh great, thats info I can work with. Gonna check it out immediately.

In the meantime, please ammuse yourself with the PvP version.

[sanctuary 19]

Some report after testing offline the "zscti v1.0z coop everon" mission, with some bugs noticed.

-After using the default setting (light opposition, west coop) and letting the AI being commander, for the first 10mn i noticed less stuttering than in the classic mfcti.

-Early, with the AI we took Saint Philippe then Maux.

But when attacking Tyrone, i noticed 2 East Mi24 and 1 Mi17 coming to Tyrone, then after having killed most of the AI teammates, they flied to the north and attacked our base destroying 2 buildings.

Hmm, not sure why the East AI had 3 chopper so early in the game, that is not really fun , as your AI teammate had great difficulties to deal with them (i had to make all the work by myself with several DCA launcher bought repeatedly in the casern , fortunately the East choppers did not destroyed it...) .

-Then , after the battle was moved to Montignac (the first stuttering began to appear) i built there an hospital with some ammo and weapons crate with a Repair truck and took out a shilka and a T80 with some Carl Gustav. My AI squad helped to stop an infantry attack.

But i never saw a single friendly M1 (while the East AI built several T80)

-After the East superior armies and vehicles finally crushed us in Montignac, i respawned in the main base (as there were a bit too much infantry and soldier for me to respawn in the hospital i built there) and the stuttering began to be a bit more pronounced.

-There while i was waiting for 2 M1 to be built with the money i just earned , 2 T80 supported by a Shilka ran into our base , and the stuttering began really heavy , it was there that an error message involving some boolean error was displayed , but it doesn't stopped the game.

-Fortunately, the law soldier present (with a help of my Carl Gustav) took out the invading tanks.

But it was +/- beginning with that moment , the AI commander never built anything more.

And with all the destroyed vehicle, it never built anymore recycler, so it didn't help to lighten the stuttering in some places.

I am not sure if the AI commander stopping activities began with the boolean error or not (but since the boolean error, the stuttering was at the level of the 1.16 MFCTI one in the middle game) , as i was a bit busy to try to stop the tanks invasion and use my new 2 M1 to take back Montignac.

With all the destroyed vehicles not being recycled because of the AI commander problem, the stuttering in the main battle places was too much to have anymore fun as there was a lot of objects and then i ended the game.

Not as lag free as the Cleanrock's CTI , but better than the 1.16 MFCTI in that area, congratulations.

It just need a bit more bug fixing and it will be a really interesting CTI.

[Pimmelorus 0]

Thnx for this detailed report. Currently, I am looking into the Coop version. I am puzzled why the Coop version would be bugged (found a possible small problem, but noting big..) as there are only a few number of differences between MFCTI PvP and Coop versions.

Anyway, screen shots of errors would be really appreciated. You can send them to pimmelorus@ofp-zeus.com.

Thnx, Pimmelorus

[SEAL84 0]

Played the Malden Coop z-version with a friend for about 2 hours last night...had the same problems with the enemy having 2 choppers very early on. Our AI commander built all the necessary buildings but I never saw any tanks, just a few Vulcans. Also no additional salvagers were built.

We started in the northern desert and for quite a while our AI squads were just sort of wandering, but about 2 hours into the game they went on the warpath and took a few towns - we didn't see how those teams were equipped though.

Hopefullly you can get those bugs worked out...if you have a new version ready tonight we plan to play again, so we can test it for ya.

[SEAL84 0]

We played again - the Everon coop this time - and things got screwy...

The Russians again had choppers coming out of their ears very early in the game...towards the end I jumped in an Apache and shot down 2 KA-50s, 3 Hinds and like 4 Mi17s in the space of 5 minutes. They must have built 50 choppers in a game that lasted maybe 3 hours, and we weren't using any of the chopper cost modifiers.

Also at the end, we got lag - this error would pop up and things would just stop for like 5 seconds. This happened every minute or two until we quit.

I played as the overall commander, so I was able to help the AI along...for some reason none of the AI is set to "independent" at the beginning of the game, so I had to manually toggle them all...after I did that they seemed to take the initiative in purchasing more gear, but didn't build that many tanks, even after I designated a couple of groups heavy armor and transferred them some money.

Also noticed that the mortar, the AK101, and the AIM-9s are missing textures.

[sanctuary 19]

Played another zcti coop everon tonight , but this time in commander position, always West coop and Light opposition , i had the exact same base position (east of Saint Philippe).

-I didn't noticed the boolean error from my previous post (too bad i had not the reflex to screenshot it), maybe it can occurs with AI commander only ?

-I noticed a very lot less stuttering than in my previous post, maybe the boolean error that didn't occured was an important one , making some scripts crazy and ressource killing.

-While i was giving orders to the AI teams (i noticed that none of them was set as Independant too) , as i wanted to rally them in one point for a massive attack on Montignac i had this error poping up.

it did not stop the game fortunately (and i never saw this on the game played in my previous post).

-At some point, after my second recycler was destroyed i noticed that one of my recycler was at the base and the AI driver was out of it , in "safe" mode (its gun in the back).

As there was several destroyed vehicles around (and one enemy tank ruined at 100m of us) and as he never tried anything, i shot him , destroyed the empty recycler and build another automated one.

This time the AI driver stayed in, but it never moved for the duration of the game, i built another a same problem , he stayed in the base, never moving.

This occured after i was killed in Montignac (there was a big battle there , and i helped to win it with 3 M60 but was killed by a T80).

Maybe the recycler scripts was puzzled by my death/respawn ?

-The East AI built several T80 and Shilkas (i had -not- voted the extra money ON), while despite i assigned some AI teams to tank , i never saw from the hour i played a single M1 or better.

I saw 2 M60A3 some Vulcans but that's it.

And , judging by the fact we had the upper hand in the number of towns controlled (i was often helping to take and defend towns), i guess it was not a question of money.

Unless the opposite AI is a very lot advantaged by a lot of extra money (it would be strange, as i selected Light Opposition)

-Again, i saw an East KA-50 and a Mi17 flying to us in the first 10mn (but this time , with the experience from my previous game i thought about this , made several AA soldier in my team and destroyed them quickly before they can harm my buildings)

That is all i can report, i did not noticed any other problems for this game.

[SEAL84 0]

-At some point, after my second recycler was destroyed i noticed that one of my recycler was at the base and the AI driver was out of it , in "safe" mode (its gun in the back).

As there was several destroyed vehicles around (and one enemy tank ruined at 100m of us) and as he never tried anything, i shot him , destroyed the empty recycler and build another automated one.

This time the AI driver stayed in, but it never moved for the duration of the game, i built another a same problem , he stayed in the base, never moving.

This occured after i was killed in Montignac (there was a big battle there , and i helped to win it with 3 M60 but was killed by a T80).

Maybe the recycler scripts was puzzled by my death/respawn ?

-The East AI built several T80 and Shilkas (i had -not- voted the extra money ON), while despite i assigned some AI teams to tank , i never saw from the hour i played a single M1 or better.

I saw 2 M60A3 some Vulcans but that's it.

I forgot to mention that those things happened to me, too. I did see one or two friendly M-1s built by the AI (though I manually gave some of the AI teams M-1s when I was overall commander) but most of the tanks were M60s. M-1s *are* expensive so it's not really that surprising, I guess....but the enemy seems to have no problem cranking out tanks and choppers.